


The Third Day

by Nempolis



Series: Riverdale White Vipers [1]
Category: Chilling Adventures of Sabrina (TV 2018), Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: But that's not all folks!, Like once though, M/M, Mentions of Sex, Minor Character Death
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-04
Updated: 2018-12-04
Packaged: 2019-09-07 09:04:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,477
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16851175
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nempolis/pseuds/Nempolis
Summary: Joaquin’s Ghoulie juvie BF comes with all kinds of unexpected Greendale perks.For the people who’ve asked: “The Cain pit though??” Or, alternatively; “There are like, literal witches just the next town over”





	The Third Day

Louis wasn't able to find him until the third day.

 

Their plan was to meet on the old wooden railway bridge that connected their two towns. It was a plan set in stone since they’d very first begun to dream and then seriously consider an escape. Joaquin would get in and out with his things, come to get him, he’d pack, and then they’d leave for California. That was the plan. 

 

As he sat on the wooden joists haphazardly he began to think if maybe he’d had it wrong. Joaquin was a snake, maybe he’d seen Louis as little more than someone who treated him well as a companion but not worth any personal risk now that he’d gotten free. 

 

No though, that didn't make much sense. Even if they didn't stay together physically or romantically there was a simmering shared need for vengeance that they shared. The perfect kind of bond to start friendship. Even without the sex, he knows that he still has that from the other. His hands reach to fold under his head, small stones litter the wood and he tosses them over the edge of the bridge and makes himself comfortable. Joaquin technically has another 3 hours to show up, he’d just been too anxious to wait anywhere else. 

 

The tall pine forest around him already blocks out a large portion of the weak fall sun, but when he next opens  
his eyes the world around him has darkened a touch. His phone is in his duffle bag but as he reaches inside to grab  
it he already has a sinking feeling that it’s past the time they’d agree was inside the boundary.

 

Sure enough, though he’s squinting, he can read in the bright illumination of his phone that it’s 5pm, two hours after the bound for their latest time. He shakes his head, holds the phone in both hands before he figures, “Fuck it”, and calls him. 

 

The line rings only once before it’s picked up and he sucks in sharply with maybe relief but maybe also the need to have air in his lungs before he really lets Joaquin have it. He’s got a few choice curses for him when an unfamiliar voice cracks over the line angrily, “Who’s this?”

 

Now that worries him, he ignores the others request blithely and with more confidence then he should probably have says, “This is Joaquin's phone, put him on the line.” He almost instantly regrets his assertive tone as the last thing he needs is for the person on the other end, who is most definitely not Joaquin, to hang up. He beats the feeling down and instead doubles down, “I can still hear you over there, put him on” It’s true enough, he’s been able to make out a faint squabble on the other end of the phone which sounds like the mystery man is consulting with someone else. Finally, he hears the same unfamiliar voice say, “No can do”. Louis bristles.

“As in, he’s not there, or you won’t?” he asks in a clipped tone.

He hears a scratching and shuffling noise followed by an angry, ‘the fuck Fogarty?’ the voice on the other end is different now, more liquid than the angry tone of the first one. “Who are you? and then I’ll get Joaquin” He hears the other say slowly, He’s not sure what kind of test this is but if that's what they want than fine.

“Louis” he says. 

He can hear his name being repeated more loudly on the other end of the phone, before the voice comes back on “Yeah he seems to know you”. He isn't sure what to make of that but the other’s voice almost seems disappointed, like Louis has proved some kind of a point. He ignores his growing uneasiness with the situation and says again, “Put him on”.

The phone is quiet for a bit after that, only the static noise that was expected of small-town cell connection in forested areas. There are a few warbled sounds over the phone that he hears and the distant voices of the two speakers. He’s about to demand again when the phone clicks and changes to speaker. 

The first sounds are what set all this wearing bells off, small pathetic, scared and painful sounds that he just knows are Joaquin's. He’s heard them before, watching him in the ring or when the warden ‘persuaded’ him into G&G. The more aggressive of the two grits out in a mean voice, “Huh? seems like he doesn't want to talk to you” 

More distantly he can hear the other calmer voice warningly, “Sweets….”

Louis almost misses it all, focused on Joaquin's quick breaths, the wet sound of him trying to breathe through fear and probably a gag, Christ, it makes him want to vomit. 

There's a rustling on the other end that's hard to make out but the mean one is telling Joaquin to get up, Joaquin's heavy breathing seems angrier than anything now and Louis finds himself simultaneously pleased and hopeful as well as cursing the other for being so stupidly stubborn. 

There's a scarp and he thinks that the phone must have been dropped, it’s confirmed as much when the angry shit on the other end yells to the other man, “Fogarty! get over here and tie his legs he just shin kicked me!” Louis clams up, fucking stupid, STUPID Joaquin!

The sounds continue on for stretches of time that feel endless and he can hear himself become more desperate as he says “Joaquin!” over and over.

Then the line clicks, and he’s left in silence. Alone with the knowledge that Joaquin is somewhere out there, maybe only a mile from him now, being bound and beaten. 

He tears at his hair and almost laughs in hysterics when he realizes their situation. Two escaped convicts making a run for it, one of them being grabbed off the street. Who exactly do you call for that?

He doesn't know, but he tries Joaquin's number five more times.  
He gets no response.

 

Not the fucking police, not after what they’ve done. Not Joaquin's gang who the other confided he’d probably be made a target of for stabbing the clean-cut redhead teen that was somehow a gang member of his. Even the Ghoulies, though still in Riverdale, were going off the rails working for some millionaire crime kingpin. He thinks of his friends next, and then about having to explain away why they've never seen Joaquin why he’s got a fucking snake tattooed in the inside of his arm. Why he lakes the more ostentatious fashion tastes of most Ghoulies. 

 

And he realizes he doesn't care. 

 

Erin was the first one he’d called when he’d escaped. The other had given him a rundown of current events and a very succinct warning not to rejoin their ranks. After what he’d learned he appreciated the fact that Erin wasn't more fanatical, that she was willing to just let Louis become another person who slipped away. Ghosting their way out of the gang, forgotten. 

He really should have just done as much. Would have, if it wasn't for the fucking Serpents being beyond possessive of their own. So he calls her, guilty as it makes him feel to have to bring another person into the fold, he calls her. She picks up after a couple of rings, he thinks she must have been debating with herself. The knife of panic he’d felt when he realized she might really not pick up, if she believed it was in his best interest to just run fades. Her voice carries over the line concerned and confused, “What is it Louis?”

“Can you come get me?” he asks hopefully.

He hears her sigh on the other end, “I….I really think it’d be best if you go, things here are getting too crazy, it’s not safe”

“No I know that, but I'm out here alone so which is worst right now?”  
There's a pause on the other end and he thinks he's got her,  
“Okay, where are you?”

“The old bridge”

“Hmm” she hums, “See you soon then”

“See you soon”

No more than 10 minutes later and a pickup truck lurches and rolls over a hill and down the path towards where he’s continued laying on the bridge. He stands up and kicks a few more stray stones into the water and watches over the rail as they plop and disappear beneath the black waters of sweet water river. It’s almost dark now. 

His boots crush up the gravel path, he throws his duffle bag into the bed of the truck, and throws himself down next to Erin in the cab. She huffs an amused laugh and takes a good look at him. They haven't seen each other yet, just calls over the phone. She looks different somehow, like she's in starker contrast. She already has near black hair, it must be the lack of sun that's given her such pale skin and a somewhat gaunt look he reasons. 

After sizing him up, charmingly, she grabs his elbow and says, “My my aren't you as handsome as ever” Now it’s his turn to snort he shoves her arms away as they come up to circle around him but she shoves right back letting her arms settle loosely around his neck. “I’m glad to see you” she says sincerely. And he doesn't know how to work up the same tone so that she knows just how much he agrees. So he just allows himself to fall into her.

She lets him go after only a few seconds, but it’s more than enough for them. He figures now is as good a time as any to ask her what's on his mind. Before she begins to question him for the full story of juvie and if they had to shiv anyone. 

“Has there been news with how things are going”

Erin is putting the truck in reverse, her entire body twisted to look out the back window. Despite this he can still see her brows furrow, “I don't think so?” she pauses for a minute to set the truck into drive before she suddenly says, “Wait, no, yes, there are others who escaped. Two snakes, no one knows where they are. We’d found one but he disappeared this morning” 

She gives him a sideways glance before adding, “The higher-ups thought it’d be good to get one, but they want a particular one said he’d be more valuable than that dog we took a month ago”

“Really?” he adds, going for nonchalant but landing squarely on strained.

“Yeah but seems like we weren't the only ones looking….”  
Her brows furrowed again and she glances more fully at him, safe driving be damned apparently. 

“Listen, I don't know why you’re asking but if-”

“Yea, I’m looking for the snake as well”

Her eyes narrow, then she swerves right and parks so quickly he’s thrown forward in his seat and then rocked back. 

“There it is!” She cries urgently

“There WHAT is?”

“The shit you’ve managed to land yourself in this time!”

“Oh come ON Erin!

“You like him don't you” She gets no reply, she throws her hands up, “You’re so fucking gay Oh my GOD”

He knows that she’ll still help him, and she doesn't disappoint. She calms down fairly quickly and with an exasperated huff. it doesn't even look like she's as annoyed as she would usually be.

He smirks a bit, when she looks over and sees him she hits him lightly.

“And what have you got to be smiling about?”

“Absence makes the heart grow fonder” is all he says looking out the window as she pulls the truck back onto the road, making sputtering noises of protest all the while. 

 

Erin helps him that night, drives him wherever he can think of, and when he pulls their search into the early daylight hours encroaching on 2 and then 3am, she finally convinces him that he should either drive or that they should stop since she’d fall asleep at any moment. He rolls out his sleeping bag that's attached to his duffle in the back and they share it sleeping under the stars in the bed of the pick up. His stomach twist anxiously but exhaustion grabs him soon enough.

 

That morning he’s woken up by an obnoxious ringtone that Erin wakes up to with a jolt and she grabs for her phone quickly. She listens to the person with rapt attention and hums her agreement with repeated yeses interspersed before she hangs up. 

“We gotta get going, this is a pretty heavily Serpent area.”

She’s almost frantic in her jerky motions to spur him on as she begins to roll his sleeping bag for him with shaky uneven hands. He takes it from her and rolls it himself, shooting her a concerned look. She looks up at him dazed before saying, “They’ll want to hurt us...if they find us”

He blinks lamely at her, “What”

“He’s dead”

He can hear all the blood in his head and behind his eyes, “What.” he repeats again.

“They found the boy dead!” 

 

“Who found him dead?” his anger is building, if the Serpent's killed him, their own, heaven help them. Worst still if they just left him out to be discovered like all those other horrific murders, to look like a gargoyle king death not some gang-related hit. 

Erin seems to know what he’s asking through the thin veil of white rage he can’t hide from her. “They did” she says, slowly, and watches as it penetrates his haze. She can see his mind work from behind his eyes.

“It was someone else” she confirms. Watching the news shatter him almost breaks her too.

The gargoyle king wouldn't do this to them he thought, they’d paid their dues. They deserve their place, not some meaningless death. He couldn't reason through the intense waves of pain that choked him. He just shook his head the word ‘no’ dying on his lips each time. Erin came up beside him, made herself a place against his side, and held him tightly. 

They stayed like that for a bit, maybe five minutes. She shifted around to make them both more comfortable leading them both onto the slightly damp ground. Lightly she called to him, “Louis” she said, and again, “Louis”, “Louis”,”Louis”.......  
She carded her fingers through is hair.  
His name continues to lull him from her lips,  
Until he blinked up at her blearily, “what”.

She tensed as if she was about to say something even more terrible to him, but then she was moving to set her lips near the shell of his ear. She leaned in close and whispered lowly, “Louis, The Caine pit….”

**Author's Note:**

> Will Probably being doing more with Joaquin/Louis. Soft Bad-boy with soft boy who's done worse, since Casey's interview hurt me too much for Joavin for the time being.


End file.
